westwhere | the channeling

THE CHANNELING

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WEALTH WHISPERS

Assignment: the Merchant fears that Matthias, alleged father of the undead Brotherhood, might be the ‘merchant’ who was due to receive dark water-infused grains by sea from the Hand. Chasing information, the Merchant routes party members towards the docks-side underworld district of Tibras, in the outskirts of Ephes. The Hand keeps grain warehouses nearby.

In Tibras, short and decayed houses are like parasitic growths toppling each other, plaster peels falling into rivulets of bloodshed. Tension thrives. Petrified, natives overwhelmingly number beggars, pleasure workers, crude bounty hunters and thieves, who look to cut throats or purse strings. Occasional bodies drift by the docks.

■ Just outside of Tibras is the abode of the merchants’ syndicate — a ring of warehouses, private clubs and houses of currency. Merchants here are protected via steep fees and travel freely. Inside the syndicate house, doorways are barred by inextinguishable living fire — which you can cross unharmed, if you rearrange the runes marked N, W, S, E on a nearby wall in a cardinal-point formation. You can also pretend to be a servant, a merchant or quality inspector to get to the Hand warehouses. Ask a clue.

Alternatively, the Merchant forewarns that a notable guest will join the syndicate for three nights: Captain Maximilian Hawk of the Dawn’s Reach Trade Company, which deals in magical artefacts. Hold him at knifepoint, seduce him, do your worst for knowledge!

■ By the entrance to Tibras is the shop of Apollonius, noted collector of supernatural artefacts and information broker. Crafty and sly, he will cooperate, in exchange for a pair of ‘eyes’ from the ghost Tykhe, who haunts the nearby anonymous burial grounds. Come midnight, Tykhe’s spirit — whose sight was gouged — appears and picks out and bewitches a pair of marbles, buttons or stones to act as her ‘eyes.’ With them in hand, she searches the graveyard for her dead sister, Cassandra. You can steal the orbs, or she’ll give them freely, if you escort her from tomb to tomb to reunite with the mute ghost of Cassandra. Return to Apollonius.

■ Deeper within Tibras is a gambling nest of sailors who were cursed by a scorned sea witch to assume the appearance of sea creatures. Led by the giant octopus Crassus, they charge protection fees from commercial merchant ships and even intimidate pirates, gleaning information from sailors and recovering drowned bodies. This illustrious group adores games of chance — as long as you can cover your losses.

You can decide or RNG how many tries it takes for your character to win — submit a finished thread to get a question! The higher the stakes, the better the information.

— a scantly informed junior goldfish throws dice. Lose, and you must share a highly embarrassing secret.

— a moderately informed catfish, offering Baccarat. Lose, and he steals your good luck for 24 hours.

— a composed, well-informed whale plays roulette. Lose, and you must share one of your most precious memories.

— a highly-knowledgeable shark, Aurelius Longus, plays a mean hand of poker. Lose, and he asks blood or a pledge to save his life one day.

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THE FLOORS

Senate leader Caius Justus exits his seclusion, ending weeks of prayer to convey the message of Ephes’ divine patron, the Chained God of chaos. And he says in a public speech:

Friends, Ephesians, countrymen…

”Friends, Ephesians, countrymen, lend me your ears. I come to speak for the Chained Father, not to praise him. The victory men reap lives after them; but cowardice is often buried with their bones. So let it be with Ephes. The noble Senate tells you, the Chained Father wishes only Ephes’ destruction. If it were so, it is a grievous fault, and grievously has the Father answered for it. Here, under leave of Messalina and the Senate – for Messalina is an honourable speaker; so they are all, all honourable speakers – come I to speak of the Chained Father’s wishes. He was my maker, faithful and just to us: but Messalina says, turn away from him. And Messalina is an honourable speaker. He has brought many territories under the heel of Ephes. In his name did the Hand rise: did this in the Chained Father seem unworthy? When now you weep asking empire, the Chained Father answers: tells you to be made of sterner stuff. Yet Messalina says the Father is unworthy. And Messalina is an honourable speaker. You all did see that I withdrew to his temple, where he spoke to me: Ephes, seize your path alone — was that unworthy? Yet Messalina says to turn away from him. And sure, Messalina is an honourable speak. I speak not to disprove what Messalina spoke, but here I am to speak what I do know: you are all children of Chaos, not without cause. What cause withholds you, then, to use the Hand yourselves? O, ambition! You have fled to brutish citadels. And men have lost their courage. Bear with me: my heart is in the temple, there with the Chained God, and I must pause and beg the Senate to vote against Messalina, til it comes back to me. ”

Returning to public life, Caius Justus advises the Senate to refuse Messalina’s proposal, but defers to a vote. Citing recent civil unrest, he imposes citadel-wide 10 p.m. curfews, bans congregations of more than eight people in the streets and sends the Hand to confiscate any visible weapons and to quiet or pre-empt unrest. Hand members — forced to present in large numbers — appear erratic, prone to violent outbursts and to taking out their anger on civilians. Hand leader Narula is excessively smug.

Newscasters are careful with their words, speeches decrying Messalina abound, and senators are‘escorted’ by Hand delegations, also for their protection. Caius Justus announces he will run again for Senate leadership — to begrudged murmurs among Senators, given his previous pledge to retire.

Assignment: lure Senators toward the position that the party supports. After Caius Justus’ return:

■ 51 Senators back Caius Justus to refuse Messalina’s proposal.

■ Maximus Faustus convinces 53 Senators to accept Messalina’s proposal

■ Caelius Silvanus persuades 47 Senators to vote to postpone a decision on Messalina’s proposal for another season.

Following the party’s previous interventions, Senators are open to considering Messalina’s cause. Many are skittish, fearing their careers or lives will end with disobeying Caius Justus. Optionally, party members previously assigned a political role might receive threats from Caius Justus’ supporters.

■ Persuade, bribe, threaten or blackmail a minor Senator to switch votes. Perhaps you can offer coin or rally supporters in the marketplace for their next election, or heal their donkey or get rid of that pesky boy mooning after their daughter. Or maybe prove their corruption streak, or place a polite knife at their throats. Hold the whole Senate floor hostage, if you want, of blockade Senators from entering the Senate on voting day!

■ Ask for a RNGed Senator if you want or submit threads of swaying votes. A final tally will be taken on 19 November

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INCENSE

Priests of the Chained God whisper that the god shows signs of awakening to trigger an apocalypse. Chained and warded twelve times to prevent the end of the world, the Chained God allegedly rests in the Halls of the Sleeper, in the underground belly of his main temple in Ephes. Above ground, the temple is silent, rife with milling priests, hummed prayers and cloying hallucinogenic incense that encourages lethargy. Access is unrestricted, but monitored.

To progress downstairs, you may need to convince guards that you are one of the groups of ferociously devout pilgrim worshippers, or a priest. Below, you feel overcome by creeping, paralysing dread.

■ You are haunted by sinister, saccharine voices murmuring intrusive thoughts only you hear, diminishing your worth and paranoically asking if your companion means you harm. You are more irritable and prone to violence.

■ The halls increasingly resemble narrow subterranean corridors with limited and overheated air reserves. You reach locked stone gates, covered in loose chains and crudely carved with the inscription, the Sleeper awakes. Instructions state the Chained God demands sacrifice and proof of chaos.

■ To enter the Sleeper’s Hall, instructions say, you must commit an act of betrayal, by: drawing your companion’s blood and smearing it over the inscription (lean into the corruption!), which prevents them from entering the halls with you; or chaining them to the door with the gate shackles, condemning them to watch as you enter; or pushing your companion away, verbally eviscerating or attacking them until they flee. With player approval, your character could get a sense of what theirs is emotionally or physically vulnerable to, then exploit it. Acts of betrayal cannot be faked.

■ The Sleeper’s Hall is narrow, nearly spherical and lit by thin rivers of flowing magma that cross cracked floors. Amid swelter, you hear the periodic gulps and quakes of stone trembling around you. The supernaturally sensitive feel the presence of great, if constrained power.

■ The black water previously associated with the undead also gushes from rifts in the ground. It has a cold, sinister aura.

■ Search the room for clues — and leave urgently, before corruption consumes you.

■ Towards the middle of the room is a large, nebulously shaped creature, fully fettered and covered in magical wards, chains and blood-painted runes. Anyone in the Chained God’s presence may feel overcome by emotional or physical agony, claustrophobia and bloodlust — but the divinity only speaks with the RNG winner.

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NOTES:

■ Some players have asked about potentially ~~stabbing~~ ousting Caius Justus and Narula in a coup — everyone can plot and participate in that, and a plotting post will go up on 16 November.

■ NPC inbox, if you need anyone!

■ QUESTIONS

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Licyn barely flicks a glance her way, the stiffness in his form a reaction to the incense, the burning of it in his eyes and nostrils and down his throat; the creeping sense of imbalance, anger and fear and hurt that he never trusts anymore, his own instincts pushed out of equilibrium. All he thinks he might trust, to some degree, is the sense of magic all around them, the roiling clot of it deeper down, rubbing against his skin like a cat's tongue. He hates it, is frightened by it, and that sings loud along with the voices who remind him:

You should have died when they did.

Only that's been so true, for so long, that he simply accepts it. There are few things he can hear that aren't part of what he already believes, no matter how twisted.

Your fear will be your undoing.

But it already has been. It already was.

"More fun with gags," he says, smile a beat late and crooked in a way that looks almost twitchy. They're not yet in the front of this line of begging for access, and he doesn't want to go down there, doesn't want to make it to that opening and the heaviness of magic and imbalance, yet that's exactly what they're meant to do.

Searing terrible plans, every Storming time.

"Have you ever worshiped a god?"

Her gaze moves to find the source of that gag joke, a little blush gracing her cheeks as the notion crosses her mind. "I'm sure I don't know what you mean by that," she says.

You never will, though - who would want to try showing you any bit of fun, when you're nothing but a child in their eyes?

Her inner voices sound like a mix of hers, and Bellatrix Lestrange, and voices she doesn't recognise - but it doesn't mean they're wrong.

She presses her lips together firmly, and shakes off the sliver of self-doubt that wants to burrow in, like a knife in her side. They have to wait - entrance to these temples always come with a price, most often psychological.

"I don't worship," she murmurs, contrite. "It's a bit hard to have faith when you see all the injustice in the world - especially when said injustices are committed in the name of belief."

"I'm sure you do," he says in turn, this time more easily amused, turning his face toward her. "Wanting to admit it has little to do with knowing, love."

Like so many things in his experience, and so many more that he avoids to stay away from the troubles that inevitably followed. His gaze trails back to the front, watching the last few supplicants before them. The one who'd just spoken with the guardians of this place weeps, turned away; the ones to step in after shudder as leaves in an autumn gale.

"Faith is what you make of it." What you don't make of it, too. "Faith in self, or faith in people making strange decisions, or faith in inns having some sort of stew ready for the serving. Worship doesn't need faith. It just needs motivation."

The worship of bodies and lovers, the worship of concepts above all else: the adoration of power. He grimaces as the feel of this place buffets at his lacking defenses, and he wish he were not so aware of his own magic-leaking nature, wondering belatedly if appetites below may find it appealing.

Surely not?

They always are.

Honestly, she prefers him when he's a big furry wolf and not talking to her about gags and fun with gags, and all that. She is going to focus on the task at hand: enter the temple, figure out the mysteries of the Chained God before not knowing threatens to undo them all.

"That's very profound," she murmurs under her breath, not letting her gaze drift towards him. She is trying to appear contrite and penitent, a pilgrim making her way inside a temple over here. Not a cynic, muttering under her breath and all.

The guardians come into view and clear their throats, guiding them both to direct their attention to the chained gates behind them. Prove you are worthy of entering. The Chained God demands sacrifice, and proof of chaos.

And since she and Licyn have reached the front of the line together, she looks to him now, a little flicker of panic crossing her eyes at the thought of sacrifice. Hermione Granger is not killing people for knowledge.

He chuckles, almost losing the edge to the sound by the time they're before the guardians. Then he's easy smiles, and the fluttering of lashes down, letting Hermione hang herself in the moment of panic only to say:

"Such is our penance in devotion at the feet of the Chained One, that love is chaos, and chaos is love, beating with our hearts, in our blood." Pretty nonsense, but the way he says it, the downcast glance as if shy, before he drags his eyes up, holds the guardian priest's eyes with his own, letting his own desire to not be here shine through with a desperation that has them waved through with a murmur of acceptance and their promise to pay proper homage in their pilgrimage, as the others do.

Shuffled off to a door that he near balks at, for the way it feels worse, almost a force to walk against, a current in a river they didn't know they waded. Hermione might feel him attempting to turn away, then turning back, grimace impossible to hide from her, hidden from those behind them by the fixed nature of his staring down through the open archway.

"Do we have to?"

A number of options run through her head, when coming to stand before the gate demanding sacrifice. What kind of sacrifice, how chaotic, how mean? Would it be satisfied if she nicked her finger, or does it expect her to slice open her palm?

Or, worse than that, would it demand she do it to Licyn - or vice versa.

She turns to him and notes his shifty look and blinks. "Are you - are you suddenly unsure you want to be here?"

The glance he gives her is a little wider eyed than he would like, if he felt more in control. He doesn't, and doesn't pretend to, but he does think they need to know slightly more about this Lightning-struck nonense, and so he's here.

His grimace shows teeth when he replies. "You don't feel that?"

The horrible, grating pressure of the magic that lingers below, that builds like pressure against his skin, leaving him feeling as if he'd rather climb out of his own than get closer to the source. Problems he only knows because of Wrath telling him in this world, his linking the reality of his own apparently excessive magical nature, and the interaction with magics around.

the channeling

okay but what if he just runs away at the door, is that betrayal enough

that's just licyn doing what he does best

bravely running away

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